


Olfactory

by LyraNgalia



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Obsession, Science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-16
Updated: 2013-10-16
Packaged: 2017-12-29 13:50:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1006188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LyraNgalia/pseuds/LyraNgalia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes discovers a subtle but important difference in his coat after its return by Irene Adler.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Olfactory

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr as a flash fic, but I've come to realize I like the mood of it well enough to want to keep it from getting lost.

His coat smelled of her.  
  
It took him three days to categorize the exact differences in his coat after she returned it. The most obvious was the smell of the city, the scent of bus exhaust and soot, the faint whiff that told him she’d walked by a smoker of clove cigarettes, the itch of spice that was obviously from the curry house down the street.  
  
Those had been easy. The scents of his city, the threads that were easily unraveled.  
  
Her scent had been more difficult, more elusive, having worn far deeper into the fibers of his coat than the city’s dust, which clung lightly to the surface and offered up their clues after a cursory shake.  
  
Her scent taunted him in the upturned collar of his coat, a tendril of it teasing his attention when a light breeze brushed the fabric closer to his nose.  
  
Perfume.  
  
He pored through his list of women’s perfumes and found nothing that matched, not exactly. Jasmine. Sandalwood. Things that were close, but not the same. John made tea, and he swore he caught her scent in the fragrance of Earl Grey. And again, in the cake that Mrs. Hudson bought from the cafe owner. If he had been anyone else, he would have been called obsessed. Obsessed with _her_ , to find traces of her perfume everywhere. But he was Sherlock Holmes, so he was merely focused. Determined. Utterly set on discovering exactly what it was that lingered on his purloined and returned coat, but refusing to appear focused, refusing to _appear_ like he cared.  
  
Eventually, he managed it. Sandalwood. Vanilla. Bergamot. _Casmir by Chopard_.  
  
Or so his research told him. He acquired a sample. John assumed it was for his website. Close, extraordinarily close, but it lacked something still, something at once warm and cold, sharp and soft. He told himself it was the reaction of body chemistry to the essential oils and scents in the perfume that made it seem different. Told himself that the Woman wore Casmir, that the scent caught in the deep fibers of his coat was the perfume.  
  
He told himself that the puzzle had been solved, the pieces fitted together. That he no longer needed to be curious, no longer needed to draw the coat closer to him for warmth, that he’d never once actually caught himself drawing a deeper breath to catch the elusive scent.  
  
He now knew that the Woman wore Casmir, and that should have been the end of the puzzle.  
  
But, he did not wash his coat.

 


End file.
